10 Wrestling Heels Who Generated The Most Heat

1. Ric Flair

Hollywood Rock The Rock Concert 2003
WWE.com

Just how Ric Flair didn't descend into parody throughout the 1980s remains a mystery. Even a performer as up-to-11 loud as Flair could not be heard in that space age studio setting. The noise - formed by jeers, squeals, and stamps on the floor - drowned him out. It was as if The Man had to scream, irate, at the top his voice, just to get his message across.

Those messages remain seared into the memory; where so many promos are lost in the ether, often minutes after the mic drop, Flair's are - present tense - immensely quotable.

"What would happen, if Ronnie Garvin became World Champion? What would you do, Garvin? Would you ride down the road with that golden retriever you call a woman?"
"How do you beat Slick Ric? You don't."
"When you're a 300 pound fat truck driver, shut up!"
"There's no women in the world who likes to be called "fatso", but "sweatso", that's your name - so you sit there, and you keep your mouth shut."

And, most pointedly:

"You wanna hear that somebody's doin' good, but you don't wanna hear that they're doin' better than you."

That was the heat. Flair was a motherf*cking entertainment machine that generated more pops than the pimples smeared across the face of the gibbering, braying slobs that loathed him so much, and they hated The Man because the could never be The Man.

Scorn is the greatest heat trigger of them all. Flair loved them, and then left them furious.

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Michael Sidgwick is an editor, writer and podcaster for WhatCulture Wrestling. With over seven years of experience in wrestling analysis, Michael was published in the influential institution that was Power Slam magazine, and specialises in providing insights into All Elite Wrestling - so much so that he wrote a book about the subject. You can order Becoming All Elite: The Rise Of AEW on Amazon. Possessing a deep knowledge also of WWE, WCW, ECW and New Japan Pro Wrestling, Michael’s work has been publicly praised by former AEW World Champions Kenny Omega and MJF, and current Undisputed WWE Champion Cody Rhodes. When he isn’t putting your finger on why things are the way they are in the endlessly fascinating world of professional wrestling, Michael wraps his own around a hand grinder to explore the world of specialty coffee. Follow Michael on X (formerly known as Twitter) @MSidgwick for more!